Controlling Common Property

In this study of the Newfoundland inshore fishery, David Ralph Matthews sets out to discover how in the past two decades the harvesting and processing of fish have been transformed by changed government policy and by technological advance. He finds that not only the work of the fishermen but also the social and economic life of their communities has been altered.

In his analysis of the nature of property relations governing common-property resources, Matthews contrasts what resources mean for those who make their living from them, and what they mean for those who regulate them. He uses fisheries department and other documents to show how fisheries policy for eastern Canada's inshore fishery changed in the early 1960s, when a focus on the biological conservation of fish stocks gave way to a concern with the social dynamics of property regularion. He draws directly upon interviews, conducted in five fishing villages, that offer rich insights into local perceptions of conditions and practices. The fishing communities used to provide their own regulation; conflict occurred when government view of the nature of resource property regulation, based on assumptions different from those of the local people, were imposed.

In 1991 the Newfoundland inshore cod fishery virtually collapsed. This book looks at the reasons for the collapse. It explores the effect of underlying assumptions in resource policy on environmental change and resource development, and is a valuable case study in the nature of work relations, econimic development, and community social psychology.